Electricity, natural gas and water are examples of consumable resources that may be monitored, delivered and sold within a metered environment. The metered environment may be configured in an automated meter reading (AMR) configuration and/or an advanced metering infrastructure (AMI) configuration.
In either of these configurations, meters may transmit consumption messages and receive command, programming or other messages over one or more radio frequencies (RF). To create a secured metered environment, these command and messages need to be secured. To accomplish this, it is common for meters to contain a variety of encryption keys to provide for a secured wireless messaging environment.
Traditionally, encryption keys are installed in meters at a point of installation by a utility company meter installer. Therefore, the meter installer is required to possess encryption keys for meters, and perform a secure key injection of meter keys as part of a meter installation process. This process increases installation time of meters, reduces meter security and requires that the meter installer have a level of expertise required to perform a key injection process.